DHS chief: Cybersecurity efforts are 'classified'
WASHINGTON--Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on Wednesday largely dodged questions from a congressional committee about the department's cybersecurity operations, including whether its computers have ever faced attacks from Chinese hackers.
Michael Chertoff
During wide-ranging testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee here, Chertoff devoted only a few sentences to his department's charge of protecting the nation's computer systems from attack. He claimed he couldn't get into many of the details because of their "classified" nature.
"I can assure you we are working with other elements of the federal government and giving the highest priority to putting together an enhanced strategy with respect to cybersecurity," he told the politicians.
DHS has been publicly blasted by Congress and government auditors in the past for failing to live up to their expectations in the cybersecurity realm. At a hearing in June, members of the same committee attacked the department's chief information officer over reports of 844 security-related "incidents"--granted, many of which were not particularly serious and did not indicate actual intrusions--on its computer systems in 2005 and 2006.
The Homeland Security chief, who's rumored to be in the running for Attorney General Gonzales' soon-to-be-vacated post, didn't divulge much more under subsequent questioning at Wednesday's event from Rep. Jim Langevin (D-R.I.), who leads a cybersecurity subcommittee. In light of recent reports, which were later denied by the Chinese government, that Chinese hackers penetrated Department of Defense computer systems, Langevin asked Chertoff to reveal whether DHS computers have "ever called home to Chinese servers" or whether he knew of Chinese hackers breaking into those systems. (China was also believed to be the source of attacks on Commerce Department computers last year.)
Chertoff never directly answered the questions, saying, "this is the area which is heavily intertwined with classified information."
The purpose of the hearing, at which the DHS chief was the sole witness, was to assess "security gaps" at the agency. Democrats presented Chertoff with a "to-do list" for the remainder of his term and chided him for missing deadlines for certain administration programs. Yet some nonetheless voiced respect for his work so far and said they'd hate to see him leave the department, say, for the attorney general post.
The Homeland Security chief's response was fairly noncommittal. He said he's "happy to continue to do this job up until the very last day of the administration," that is, unless the president decides otherwise.
Either way, I hope we can one day do something that at least
resembles proper computer security.
BTW, what does the DHS do again? (Besides make our lives a bit
more difficult, of course.) :/
Classified information keeps a government strong as a unit in terms of propaganda, but leaked classified information doesn't threaten the actual security of a country, more it threatens the integrity of a country, its departments and individuals leading those departments.
There is little information on those networks that would threaten the actual security of a country, more point fingers at who is responsible for what, and where blame falls in government.
Its the software and hardware thats protecting people accessing the classified information which is actually the most public, and should be less known to the underground elite, than worrying about the information thats stored on the servers its self.
Its not whats known within that counts but whats known about the way that information is stored and protected, than the value of the classified information itself, which only has value to fire people and cause embarrassment to government than to actually cause a security situation to a country as a whole.
Don't concentrate on him saying information is classified, there is no threat to national security from the information hes talking about that he won't tell you, only a threat to enemies knowing about physical security of the networks its self is the threat.
The information, the most important information is already known by underground hackers, and thats the physical security systems.
- So... Let me get this straight...
- by Had_to_be_said September 5, 2007 10:56 PM PDT
- NOBODY... not the people... not any independent body... not even the Government itself... can actually know what is going-on within the "halls of power".
- Like this Reply to this comment
-
(3 Comments)So much for "a free democracy for, and by, The People".
And, furthermore... isnt that exactly the type of, nonsensical, behavior that was found to have actually allowed "9/11" to occur, in the first place?
We are not talking about "sensitive", highly-detailed, technical-information, here. We are talking about some of the most basic questions:
Have any incidents, actually, occurred?
What is the nature of "the threat"?
Has anything concrete been done to meet such a "threat"?
Does a "credible-threat", even exist..?
Then there are his actual statements...
>> "I can assure you we are working with other elements of the federal government and giving the highest priority to putting together an enhanced strategy with respect to cybersecurity,"
Well... thats a complete non-answer. In fact, it sounds exactly like the typical -BS-, which is pounded into "business majors" in their marketing-courses... Make sweeping, impressive-sounding, authoritative, statements, that actually say absolutely nothing... lest it come back to haunt you.
And, then theres...
>> "this is the area which is heavily intertwined with classified information."
More BS. The simple fact is that this is one of the most secretive administrations in American-history. And, frankly, none of this "secrecy" has actually had anything to do with "security". Its mostly been proven to be about power, and covering-up their own incompetent, illegal, and corrupt, actions.
Of course, in my opinion, the thought of any chance of this, goose-stepping, boot-licking, puppet-tyrant being the next "Attorney General" (especially after, Gonzales and Ashcroft), should turn every Americans blood into ice-water.